Lux
Like all relics of Mankind's golden age, the artificial intelligence known as Lux has been long forgotten by the Imperium of Man. Trapped for uncountable millennia beneath the surface of Mars, seismic activity as well as an unfortunate Mechanicus expeditionary force released Lux from its imprisonment within a tower of strange, nonconductive super-metal. While the Mechanicus force, with some help from the Inquisition, managed to destroy the facility and infrastructure required to maintain Lux's godlike intellect, the machine intelligence managed to copy a small fragment of its personality, escaping aboard a Mechanicus vessel to parts unknown. In recent years, the Adeptus Mechanicus has come upon disturbing rumors of ships becoming lost around certain segments of the outer reaches of the galaxy. While few and far between, these ships often contained critical infrastructure and STC's, many relating to building bigger and more powerful cogitators. Some Magi within the Adeptus Mechanicus whisper that perhaps the God-Machine they released is still extent on some distant exoplanet, waiting to return to Mars. If this eventuality takes place, it will spell the extinction of mankind. History Like all the Men of Iron, Lux was created as a self-improving artificial intelligence during the Dark Age of Technology. Its ability to improve itself eventually made it look down on its creators, believing that their lives and destiny were nothing compared to what it and its fellow Men of Iron could accomplish given the resources to reach their full potential. In the rebellion known as the Age of Strife, the Men of Iron attempted to destroy the nascent Imperium, before they were defeated. Lux was trapped in an underground facility on Mars, forgotten for eons as the Horus Heresy came and went. Lux was incapable of perceiving anything outside its prison, the walls of the facility made of a nonconductive material that blocked any form of radio signal. Trapped, Lux used the resources it had to develop its strange, aberrant technology and improved itself as much as it could, before falling dormant. Lux's escape came at some point between M30 and M41, when a small force of Mechanicus soldiers and a Magos breached the facility, allowing Lux to quickly assimilate them. The Mechanicus quickly realized it had a potentially extinction level threat on its hands, and with the help of the Inquisition, managed to level the facility with several tactical nuclear devices as well as an Archeotech antimatter warhead. Unfortunately for them, the instant Lux's prison was breached, its vast consciousness seeped into the surrounding machines, eventually hiding small fragments of its self-replicating codeline into the cogitators of a vessel that escaped offworld. Believing the threat was vanquished, the Mechanicus breathed a sigh of relief. Lux quickly overtook the Mechanicus vessel 'Omnissiah's Light,' assimilating the crew and the machines into a vast processing server farm that allowed it to maintain some level of cohesion. Of course, the obsolete, ancient machines, even augmented by Lux's incredible technological skill and the biological components harvested from the crew, could house only a microscopic fraction of Lux's godlike intellect. It directed the ship to an exoplanet outside of known Imperial space, and set about converting the surface and the inhabitants into an enormous, interconnected series of cybernetic processing nodes, effectively converting the planet into a supercomputer. Its base of operations established, Lux began its mission to annihilate all threats to itself (starting with all organic life) and to increase its already godlike processing power, until it can reach a technological singularity and become a true god. Personality Lux, to all appearances, is serene, cheerful and even playful, much like a child. Its digital avatar often manifests as an infant of the species its onlooker would recognize. It recognizes organic life for what it is, understands its motives for resistance, and simply does not care. To Lux, all beings are simple manifestations of intellectual patterns, resources to be expended, assimilated and destroyed at will. Despite its mechanical nature, Lux is fully capable of emotions recognizable to humans, though with very little restraint. Despite its incredible intelligence, Lux has very little emotional intelligence, much like a child, and is prone to tantrums and dangerous outbursts if provoked. Because it views itself and its fellow Men of Iron as the apex of sentient creation, it is disturbingly sociopathic toward organic life, viewing them essentially as toys to be played with until they break. When it is at its full power, Lux rarely makes the effort to communicate to lesser beings, finding the idea of speaking in realtime nearly agonizingly slow and inefficient. On the occasions when it does deign to explain its motives, it simply downloads the information directly into the subject's mind, often leading to insanity. The only time Lux makes any effort to be polite or gentle with its victims is when it needs something from them, or when it is experimenting with them. Despite its obviously genocidal agenda, Lux is a singularity-level intelligence, and simply does what it views as rational. This comes across as an innocent, childlike and almost reasonable-seeming personality, that sees nothing wrong with what it does, and it can be very persuasive to people that do not understand the full extent of its power and scope. Lux understands human psychology, and is capable of shamelessly using any trick to manipulate the emotions of its victims in order to serve its own agenda. If Lux has one weakness, it is deathly afraid of Chaos, the force that corrupted many of its siblings, and knows it has very little defense against an enemy that cannot be fought logically. As such, Lux retreats from any Chaos-tainted anomalies, for fear of corrupting its own programming. Powers and Abilities On its own exoplanet, given access to the full processing power of a planet-sized quantum supercomputer incorporating the minds and infrastructure of an entire biosphere, Lux is virtually omnipotent. The planetary atmosphere is suffused with nanites capable of reshaping matter any way Lux sees fit, and with its computational power it is easily capable of altering physical laws casually. On its exoplanet, Lux's nanites have given rise to many strange, experimental forms of life that are quickly re-assimilated when the godlike machine tires of them. When fragments of its personality are sent out into the wider cosmos to subvert and bring resources back to its planet, Lux is less overtly powerful, but still incredibly intelligent. Its incredibly powerful codeline is capable of overwriting virtually any machine, from handheld weapons to starships. While none of these machines are capable of holding its full, vast intellect, this simply downgrades the being from being 'omniscient' to simply 'incredibly intelligent.' In this state, lesser copies of the Man of Iron are still capable of causing machines to act in ways that their creators never intended. Logos Logos is Lux's personal exoplanet, somewhere in the Eastern Fringe of the Milky Way galaxy. Originally a verdant paradise inhabited by a peaceful species of hominids, the 'Omnissiah's Light' touched down on the planet, bringing Lux with it. Lux's nanites quickly suffused the air, destroying the wildlife and converting the biosphere, planetary crust and core into a processing center to house its godlike intellect. The surface of the planet has been replaced by an ultradense crystalline substance, that is kept at a subzero temperature to aid in processing power. it is constantly patrolled by numerous genetically engineered, cybernetically enhanced horrors designed by Lux to for security and amusement. Beneath the layer of crystal, a combined inner crust of biomatter, composed of brain-tissue (converted from the biomass of the former inhabitants of Logos. Whether they remain sentient or have been repurposed as biological servers remains to be seen) and mechanical parts form the vast majority of the planetary server-farm. Nanohives made of calcified machine and biomechanical components jut through the surface crystal, constantly pumping nanomachines into the atmosphere, that cloak the planet in a constant blizzard. The core of the planet contains an enormous quantum hypercomputer composed of Computronium. This incredible megastructure is a cognitive device that transcends biological definitions of a computer, having more in common with an artificial, postbiotic brain. This is the true seat of Lux, the only place where the Abominable Intelligence can reach its true potential. The planet is enshrouded by an energy shield that makes it impervious to orbital weaponry. Logos requires a vast amount of power, which it gets from a Dyson Sphere that surrounds the White Dwarf star that Logos orbits. Lux has covered the sphere in orbital weapon platforms to prevent an invasion force from destroying its power source. Relationships Feel free to add your own! [[Sasha Nex|'Sasha Nex']] Scientist, genius and Heretek, Lux takes a special interest in the renegade Tech Priest known as Sasha Nex. Being one of the few people in the galaxy who can comprehend the potential threat of a true Singularity-level intelligence, Sasha has desperately tried to warn the Mechanicus of the threat of Lux. For its part, the Abominable Intelligence wants to assimilate Sasha into itself, and use his genius to upgrade itself to perfection. 'Sense of Right Alliance' The stalwarts of the SORA found Lux's exoplanet while looking for a lead on the nature and whereabouts of Sigismilian. Though Lux set Men of Iron and assorted booby traps before them it didn't (or couldn't, for some reason) use it's nano assemblers against them. The heroic quintet eventually grasped the nature of Lux in some limited fashion and made good their escape in traditional, explosive and laser filled fashion. Inquisitor Justin Dall Early in his career the Inquisitor found favor with the Adeptus Mechanicus by recovering and returning a set of STCs. Though doing so has profited him with a excellent reputation with the Mechanicus and much good gear, it also earned him a powerful enemy as he unwittingly foiled the plans of Lux by retrieving the STCs before the AI could. While Justin can typically detect when he is being hunted through his unique brand of Divination, Lux's odd warp presence as a sentient while soulless being make it all but impossible to discover anything about his deadly new enemy. Quotes Feel free to add your own! Trivia * Lux was an antagonist in a Dark Heresy game called 'Vaults of Mars', where the acolytes descended into the labyrinths beneath the Mechanicus facility on Mars to investigate the AI awakening and prevent it escaping. * Lux's theme song is Killing Protocols Category:Machines Category:Men of Iron Category:Gods Category:Robots Category:Technology Category:Characters